currently there are over one hundred forty billion gallons of coal slurry contained in more than one hundred pound ments in west virginia alone the total quantity of coal slurry in the rest of southern appalachians. on december twenty second two thousand and eight a coal ash impoundment at the tennessee valley authority kingston fossil plant failed when an earthen dike broke spilling over one point one billion gallons of coal ash sludge over three hundred acres. coal ash sludge has waste created from the burning of coal at the kingston coal plant it is believed to contain toxic compounds including arsenic and mercury. the tennessee valley authority estimates the cost of the cleanup eight hundred twenty five million dollars this spill is ten times larger than the exxon valdez spill in alaska and is believed to be america's largest environmental disaster to date with

throwing away the next generation's most viable resource and that is water one of the best sources of water anywhere in the world and maybe the best source of fresh water and proximity to one of the world's largest fastest growing populations. you know with all the and all the lawsuits and all the carrying on that goes on in the in the press and you know the vanity fair's and. u.s. news and world reports and all at that where the authors are warning people to believe that they were absolutely strip in appalachia down to nothing. in order to get the mineral is patently untrue it's patently untrue when you look around at the forest in elton's that we have a recent environmental impact statement from the e.p.a. estimates over eight hundred square miles of mountains of already been destroyed this includes the permanent destruction of over four hundred fifty individual

mountain summits across the region the report also indicates the permanent loss of over twelve hundred miles of mountain streams. although federal regulations for mine reclamation require that mountaintop removal sites be returned to their original contour these mines are routinely granted wavers mined areas are typically graded and then hydro seeded with less bodies or grass which clings to the compacted shale and rock that now makes up the topsoil nature builds soil for free but she creates the soil very slowly and so you're talking about thousands of years to go from something like a rock mass that has essentially no soil just a very thin covering up to generate a few centimeters of soil you're talking about hundreds to thousands and tens of thousands of years continuing at its present rate the projected loss from mountaintop removal mining is one point four million acres in the next decade an area equal in size to the state of delaware. by the summer of two thousand and six

and wiley has formulated a new plan for pennies a promise. our government or a local school board state school board will do it in a way it shows and you know and parents and grandparents it's up to you to get this job there were the kids you know we're going to money for school one or your another. like we are going to school in our community and. it's rich it's showing that our government should come to this we can't get nothing done for children. we're going to watch the charleston west virginia the worse we do you see you all

know this is the rise awareness and raise money for no school and it also opens a lot of doors and applying to chapman in our communities as far as mountaintop removal what it's doing to those in in in the mining industry to our communities this is a perfectly viable one what it's actually doing to our children the governor made us dykeman our kids our future by our to morrow he should die almost up and for our jihad to march fourth don't have them are. politically. burning of coal is for over a century has been one of the most deadly things that and humans have done it through the air around them even after one hundred years of burning coal and after one hundred years of so-called improvement of air quality according to the american lung association twenty four thousand people a year still die prematurely from air pollution from coal plants in the united states almost forty percent of the carbon dioxide emissions come from coal one of

the things that has to happen. that the politicians the leaders of the administration as well as congress state legislators and administrations in the states all those leaders have got to finally say ok we want to mind color in the two thousand election and west virginia was widely credited with giving. president bush the margin he needed to take the oval office was the first time the west virginia had gone republican in something like seventy years and guess what's going to happen come november we're going to carry the state of west virginia thank the coldest it was widely credited for giving bush west virginia so it was no secret that he had a large debt to pay to the coal industry and they made sure he paid it throughout mine safety throughout the rollback of regulations on dirty power plants through a variety of places he essentially stalked all the regulatory agencies with with

former coal industry lobbyists or executives by two thousand and one the bush administration made a slight wording change in the clean water act designating waste as a bill this wording change cleared the way for the expansion of mountaintop removal mining throughout southern appalachians. on january twenty second of two thousand and two president bush returned to west virginia it is such a wonderful day for us and for west virginia to host a special me with those with a special bond to our state ladies and gentlemen the president of the united states i'm. we can do a better job in america one of these days we're going to be driving automobiles that are fueled differently and that's going to exciting times for america which is new technologies coming down and we can encourage those technologies so

conservation. take a logical development got to be an integral part of energy. folks we need more supply you know workers welcome back here in the back and he said i'm real repairing a machine that digs for gold we need to use coal we got a lot of it and we need to make sure that we. wait around. for the past twenty years larry gibson and his family have been fighting to preserve their ancestral home place on k. for down outside charleston west virginia and when i met with the coal company to fight on my property here me and my family members and they tell me that we don't give a damn about people who carry cholera we don't give a damn about the people on top of a mountain all we care about is property we will make and and that was the dollar i would have bought and the. know we were playing there and this is vice president

cultural reduction using kids from mexico one thousand nine hundred three told me this gibson created the stanley heirs foundation refusing to sell his family's fifty plus acres to coal companies before mountaintop removal began his family cemetery was surrounded by mountain ridges today the family cemetery looks out on reclaimed mountaintop removal sites eighteen years ago when i came back and it took me four years a claim up family cemetery and then one thousand nine hundred now on the third a restful and eighteen year old when i started this i couldn't get to people to listen now even own family. now i know about turning a corner how crest of the knob on a or that was there was before the snowy there in my own mind. the lord is. the young of the day were never seen where i've seen the young as of the day were

never seen the mountains the earth. no limits no boundaries for you could roam. gibson uses the land a cave heard mountain to educate the public about the effects of mountaintop removal one of the biggest questions people asked me if i had a picture of the mountain before was destroyed. here people know why should you take a picture of a mountain for it's going to be here forever. day by day the seventy five hundred acres of active mountaintop removal mine continue to encircle his property. another family cemetery sits across the ridge on the active mine site although regulations require that family members have access to these cemeteries requests are often not he's lee granted. on memorial day of two thousand and six keeps him in a group of supporters make a trip to the cemetery i want a day we're going to go on the mine site at the cemetery over there and we get to

how long around and different things going on and i it's just to me a safe. shore and probably count forty or gold it could get to cold even into a graveyard. after filling out a den of occasion and release forms the group is permitted to enter the mine site in a one and a half mile hike to the family cemetery. seat i. didn't mention having to sign a release to go visit my family to be. heard it's with you. the first waterhole i risk one man in my life was up then how high. the water was not there now we're gonna save six seven hundred foot high wall there now. my mama give me birth. in the light. well. you can get to the cemetery through there i'm.

going to go around. i used to be a road over here. one right here. over here is another one. one i hear. your people are taking part in history if the cemetery been here for two hundred seventy years and never had this many people want it in the last hundred fifty years ice time not doubt it come through here the winds are generous and kind. the superguy minister here i will tell you are a half a cent on my. show and these people for a rainy fifth graders their first time in julian come here four years ago we had kate's going to have dates on them they're no longer here if they're even in saying that we came and got him. and it's not the case and the words are taken from down

gonna say on johnson our psyche is we're just not been heard here for alone long long time in mid august of two thousand and six the west virginia department of environmental protection revoked a permit to massey energy to expand its plant and marsh fork elementary by building a second coal silo the d.p. determined that the second coal silo was placed outside the permitted boundary of three hundred feet from the school after maps of the preparation plan were found to be an accurate. list.

that. nobody would stand up. nobody would stand up to the street. i stand up for my grandmother fly i stand up to her forty two others will i represent oldfield march fourth elementary and i will stay and and i will fight and i will do whatever it takes to get something done for these children that they issued allowed him no more of alex holden or that it. was such. an. when i was. handling. nobody would. believe.

it if he said. well no i couldn't talk to as many folks i have along the way that a lot of folks shows for revenge a kind a lot of folks on the issue we've raised a little money for the new school only issue in one of our goals was to come here and hopefully make a stand a bird and i feel that we have conflict all three of them and i believe this call for a lot of doors for a lot of people on this issue you know is very important for me to walk on march fourteenth two thousand and seven the state board of surface mining overturned a west virginia department of environmental protections ruling that denied massey energy a permit to build a second coal silo behind the school this decision cleared the way for the

expansion of messy energy's coal processing facility two days later a coalition of citizen conservation groups including mountain just a summer activists returned to west virginia governor joe manchin is office. for her. thank god. god god god. and neil. first three years for the rights of those children that i see it's raining cats right now are saying tell you about smudge day i'm sorry it. doesn't mean anything to you we've preached you know for three years. to marry the people

in these camps used to be healed accountable for at least what i want to ask you to do i'm going to go back to the back corner we need to clear this way because people are going to get back and forth sure. i'm sure more work. will get a new school that's the one you're broke your i ain't playing here i'm telling you we're not budging there's more coming. your. way around the higher good despite you know what they're offering their field to market a great morning meeting a whisper in the air while you like them we want results today we want our kids to

say. share. wired to our kids a dare. for company in their code for you. they're on the wrong side of the bio. we are the cradle that bring their money out of them out of the room for more where you have very took care of his or her children. for the state good old business you such as whether school should be the new school should be built a decision goes first we have to look. i've heard the low. the school board with the decision on a new school that march forward before a vote of the people of raleigh. so they can determine the final outcome from sales so i'm. now all i could i hope that i'm corgi. herds for the. if.

you. can hear both the good read and may say. people. are still there who. are right but. i. was. i. was.

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. to the bone . culture is the same of charcoal i told her it was almost all the more in the face of an empire and disarray rupert murdoch and his immense media assets were under investigation in what is being called the voice mail is this. the bone comes to the surface what makes a big splash in the world of high tech business exploits. science into cheap products. called easy the fall of russian invaders to broaden and their big breakthrough. spotlight on story on technology update here on our own . we. covered. british roles in.

markets. opening to the global economy in the kinds of reports. more news today. in these are the images the world has been seeing from the streets of canada. today.

in india. the move to the joint either to. the gateway to the grand imperial truly told us to. socialism or to say don't need to go publicly and run this in the kennel was toto as

a treat. the first funerals for victims of sunday's pleasure boat tragedy on the boulder river held on a day of national mourning across russia many bodies remain inside the sunken ship including children trapped in a play room when the boat went down. france's foreign minister claims the libyan leader moammar gadhafi could be ready to go this as paris seeks a diplomatic solution to a conflict they felt would be a simple knock out. wiki leaks controversial founder returns to a london court to battle his extradition to sweden over alleged sex crimes.

six am in moscow good to have you with us here on r t our top story the first funerals have been held in russia's republic of tatarstan as the country mourns the victims of the worst boating accident in decades rescuers continue searching for bodies trapped under water including those of dozens of children almost one hundred people now confirmed dead our correspondent tom barton has the latest. operations continue him from the volga bank south of with divers and other teams going out to try and recover more bodies from the sun can reveal a pleasure cruise. the ball carrier meanwhile in because on itself today is a day of mourning huge crowds fountains of people gathered on the pier next to the river boat station in cars to show their respects to those that died in the sinking of the ship as a mark of respect ships were sailing the volga participated in

a blowing of their horns and a minute's silence followed to try and show respect for the dead. we went amongst the crowds and asked some of the people there what they were feeling about the aftermath of this tragic attack for. the most we study together for a year she never had arguments with anyone sure's a very kind girl and was always ready to help it's sort of. where ambulance workers a colleague was in that ship she wanted to cruise together was family husband five year old son and also she was pregnant or was to deliver her second baby noticed she's not found yet only husband has to survive she interest until i was. meanwhile back here at the site.